Is Michael Cole losing his heat?

[prosenfi]

I was noticing on tonight's Raw, Michael Cole is becoming less and less polarizing each week. I especially noticed this during the Brock Lesnar/Josh Matthews angle. Michael Cole seems to be becoming more and more even keeled, and I am actually enjoying this because with so many heels in positions of power (i.e. Johnny Ace, Lesnar, etc.), it is nice to not see them cheered every 2 seconds.

 

[ThisIsLCS]

Well he Is becoming more Bearable, but he is the male Vicky G, He wont Ever lose that heat. Only reason he doesnt seem to have any heat is cause they dont have him in the ring or on the Mic anymore so no one is really Booing him.

 

[#heel420]

His made up facts are still somewhat irritating, but without him taking up TV time like he did I find him more tolerable.

 

[Fugazi]

No way. Cole is the greatest commentator in WWE history because of his heat. He's brilliant and he continues to be brilliant. Did you hear his commentary during Jericho vs Kofi? Same old Cole.

 

[HitmanRicks]

His made up facts are still somewhat irritating, but without him taking up TV time like he did I find him more tolerable.

Yeah, every time he throws out some made-up dinosaur facts during Brodus Clay's matches, I want to jump through the TV and tell him off.

Other than that, Cole's mostly losing heat because he's not taking up precious TV time with terrible matches or insulting Jerry Lawler's dead mother. His commentary is still biased toward heels most of the time, but that's what heel announcers do. Sure, he's no Bobby Heenan or Jesse Ventura, but not many people can be. I've actually gone from dreading his voice to just being impartial to it.

 

[DirtyD79]

I don't think he's losing his heat it's that he's being used the way he's supposed to be. He's no longer dominating the show with stupidty.

 

[JohnnieGoodtimes]

Maybe television heat because he hasn't been involved in any angles, but he got standing boos when he came pre-Raw at the Joe tonight.

 

[avi01]

He is ok. Heel commentators are better when funny instead of plain annoying that subsequently brings heat. Lawyer in his prime days was hilarious, nobody hated him...he was a comedic heel that put over the heels of the company. Today tho, he is by far the worst commentator on WWE TV ..he is a terrible shadow on his own self. And to think that JR is sitting at home when he is still the best in the business.
Coming back to Cole, he has never really been that bad. In 1999, maybe he was not very good but afterwards, he did his job, specially on Smack Down. WWE`s stupid decision to replace JR by him never helped him...cause well, everybody could see it was one stupid decision. Not to mention the constant humiliations to JR. Cole`s heel run was enjoyable but you can`t go forever with that..he is just an announcer, it eventually gets in the way of the actual matches and becomes too annoying. So yeah he is ok now. Also, Michael Cole was the best thing about NXT when he was there, actually the announcing was the best thing about this show at one point.

 

[d3thRoW]

Yes! His dominating both shows with nonsense seems to have slowed way down, and I am very happy with this. He never had real heel heat to me at all, I didn't wan't to see him get his ass kicked, I just wanted him off the air somehow. No that he has become more low key it is semi-tolerable and you aren't fully distracted from the actual talent on the show. I still wish both him and Lawler would get replaced on Raw, it's really not working...JR and anybody else would be better...William Regal would be my pick, since Booker T is doing such a great job on Smackdown.

 

[cmedge]

Hopefully he turns face and King turns heel. I can't stand King as a face while I liked Cole as a heel, he is a fine babyface that he was on Smackdown until he left to Raw then he changed but nevertheless King better go heel! I doubt it will happen, I'd love for it.

 

[Vanderhook]

Michael Cole is a master heel. He's so good, that people who know the industry and *know* its all an act (smarks) still rage at his antics.

He's awesome. I love Cole.

 

[jrichardson25]

No way. Cole is the greatest commentator in WWE history because of his heat. He's brilliant and he continues to be brilliant. Did you hear his commentary during Jericho vs Kofi? Same old Cole.

Wait..... You're saying he's better than JR, The Brain, The Body, Monsoon? What?!? I have to respectfully disagree.

He has toned it down, I can appreciate that. He inserts his heel heat when he needs to and THAT makes a good commentator in this respect. He's learning not to be so annoying on the mic again and is going back to the good commentating he used to do back on Smackdown (circa 2003). He only gets riled up and spits out his heat when its absolutely necessary and that I can appreciate.

Now for the question at hand... Is Michael Cole losing his heat?
Hell no. Like someone else said he's the male equivalent of Vickie Guerrero. His presence in the ring and on the stage (when he's in either area) creates a crowd of boos like very few others have been able to do and he executes it quite well.

 

[George Steele's Barber]

He is and it is so much nicer this way. Last year the most consistent heels were Cole, Miz and Vicki in that order. Johnny Ace has taken over for Cole. It works so much nicer this way. Cole made the best out of a bad situation. Hopefully guys like Lesnar, Lauranitis, Abraham Washington, Tensai and Del Rio can be heelish enough to the point that we don't need Cole to get heels over.

 

[Death Before Disco]

Cole still draws heat, but not as much now. This is fine with me, because I found most of the commentary from 2011 to be profoundly irritating because it seemed like 70% of the commentary was Cole bickering with one of his colleagues. There were times when I muted my television.

Cole is a great commentator when he calls the matches straight. For my ears' sake, I hope this trend continues.

 

[Cabana]

Cole is playing more of a straight man, but I don't think that's a good thing. He's a natural heel and he's excellent on the mic. WWE would have done well to have made him The Miz's manager when he was still red-hot. WWE should still consider moving Cole out of commentary and into managing. He'd be a great mouthpiece for Swagger/Tensai/whomever. The guy's a natural heel, and he might be as good as Vicky at generating heat.

The Michael Cole situation is emblematic of the problem with the current WWE. He's a natural heel manager, and he'd probably be great at but the front office prefers him as an announcer. 15 years ago, Cole would have been moved from behind the announce table to the ringside. The crowd desperately wants to turn Daniel Bryan face, John Cena heel, and Zack Ryder was turning into a cash cow. I can understand milking a turn, but you have to give the fans a payoff when they want something. Make Cole a manager, bring back Joey Styles behind the mic (because I assume JR is out of the picture, even though that's who the fans *really* want.)

Off topic:
Smackdown really should have its own distinct announce team again. Frankly, I cannot fathom why, assuming JR is well enough to do RAW, JR + King aren't reunited behind the table. Let Styles + Booker T do Smackdown (I'd prefer Striker/Foley/Piper/Regal/ someone else to Booker, but let's not get too excited.) Most of all, let the announcers announce.

 

[mikeyado]

I agree with the OP. Im happy that Cole is becomming less partisan and talking less trash about wrestlers. Just call the action and try to do it in a way that doesn't annoy the hell out of me.

Personally, I hate it when commentators go to over the top to one side and become not believable, like Cole has been over the last few years. Plus, it creates embarassing flip flops, like he had to do when Bryan turned heel.

 

[KNPKH2ster]

I think Cole will still get booed whenever he talks on the mic to the audience, but I do notice that he's toning down his antics. At first I thought Cole was the major problem of the announce team in WWE, but it's really Jerry Lawler. During the time when Cole, JR, and Booker T announced Raw for one episode, I noticed commentary was a lot better when Lawler wasn't present.

Hence, the reason why I put Spanish audio on Raw since Cabrera/Rodriguez commentary duo is better than Cole/Lawler duo. SmackDown has no Spanish as alternate audio on my tv so SmackDown is the only show where I have to tolerate Cole (not including PPVs).